Exercise has become a part of many people's daily or weekly routine. This exercise varies from extremely light to extremely vigorous, and the reasons for exercising vary with each individual as well. However, one common reason is to tone or strengthen muscles. Since many people suffer from lower back pain, a common reason for many exercise routines is to strengthen and/or tone the muscles associated with a person's back. This includes abdominal as well as oblique muscles in addition to the muscles in the lower back.
Therefore, the art includes many devices that can be used to exercise these muscles. While effective, these devices have several drawbacks which may reduce their appeal to some users. For example, some users do not want to, or cannot, lie down in a prone position for exercising. This may be a special problem if the exerciser has a weak or sore back.
More specifically, since many users have need to exercise all the muscles around the entire circumference of their body that are associated with the back, any exercise device should be capable of exercising these muscles without requiring the user to lie down. These muscles include the lower back muscles as well as the oblique muscles on the sides of the user's body and the abdominal muscles, that is the muscles around the user's waist.
Therefore, there is a need for a device which can exercise the abdominal, oblique and/or lower back muscles while the user remains in a standing position.
As the user's skills and strength increase, an exercise device should have the ability to correspondingly increase its resistance. However, such increase should be easily effected and precise so even an inexperience user will be able to precisely tailor the exercise device to his or her particular needs. Unfortunately, many exercise devices currently available are not amenable to easy, yet precise, adjustment.
Therefore, there is a need for an exercise device which is easily and precisely adjusted.
Still further, many exercise device require a great deal of space and are not easily set up and knocked down. Thus, a user must dedicate a great deal of space to the exercise device. This is not desirable, especially if the user lives in an apartment or other residence where storage space is limited.
Therefore, there is a need for an exercise device that can be easily set up, and requires very little space for storage or use.